a Harrach, both eminent for their Faithfulness and Prudence.
I shall detain you no longer than to give you some Account of our Prince's private Deportment. He rises every Day at Five o'Clock in the Morning, even in the coldest Winter Months; and first, he performs his Devotion to God, then he goes to the Council to consult of Matters tending to the Public Good, 'till Dinner-time; he follows the same Course in the Afternoon, till Supper-time; I mean the Time of his Counsellors Supper, not his own: he never sups, he eats but once a Day, and that sparingly too; and is as abstemious in Drinking; he closes his Dinner with a double Glass of Wine: He passes the Night chastly, ever since the Loss of his Royal Consort: He cannot endure the trifling Amusements which many are taken with, and will have nothing to do with Jesters, Jugglers, Buffoons, Parasites, the common Delights, and yet Plagues, of Courts. He hates Idleness, is a very great Husband of his Time; if he has any to spare from public Business, which but rarely happens, he spends it in Conferences with good and learned Men, who (as I told you before) are his chief Delight, and usual Attendants whilst he is at Dinner. I believe that several of the Commons would not change their Life for his, 'tis so thrifty and severe: What Man is there that does not set apart some small Portion of his Time to indulge himself? Who would willingly deprive himself of all Delights? To whom would it not seem irksom to grow old in perpetual Care and Business. This looks more like Servitude than Sovereignty: But our Prince is of another Mind; neither doth he dissemble it in his ordinary Discourse: He says, he was advanced to so great an Office by God, not for his own Sake; that the Reins of Government were not put into
